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Alaska Supreme Court Uses Baby Veronica Ruling to Thwart ICWA

Last month, the Alaska Supreme Court issued its decision in Native Village of Tununak II v the State of Alaska and
the result has many Native observers dismayed. The language in the
September 12 decision incorporates analysis from last year’s “Baby
Veronica” ruling that legal experts, Indian child welfare advocates and
tribal leaders say strikes yet another blow at the Indian Child Welfare
Act. This new precedent, Indian analysts claim, will make it easier for
tribes and tribal members to lose their children into state custody.The case involves a six-year-old Yup’ik child who was taken at
the age of four months into state custody in 2008 and placed into a
non-Native foster home in Anchorage. Subsequently, after the child’s
mother had her parental rights terminated, the foster couple filed for
adoption, which was granted in 2012.Even though the child’s maternal grandmother had previously
testified that she wished to raise her grandchild, and in direct
contravention of the placement preferences specifically enumerated in
section 1915 of ICWA, the Alaska Supreme Court, using a single sentence
from last year’s U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Adoptive Couple v Baby Girl, ruled that the grandmother was ineligible because she had not filed adoption papers that legally signified her intent to adopt.In its ruling, the Alaska Supreme Court asserted that “The
[Supreme] Court’s initial overview of [Adoptive Couple] stated it was
clarifying that § 1915(a) preferences are inapplicable if no eligible
candidates ‘have sought to adopt the child,’ without using the word
‘formally.’ The Court did not hold that whether an eligible candidate
has come forward is a matter of federal law. And it certainly did not
hold as a matter of federal law that § 1915(a) can apply only when an
eligible person has filed an adoption petition in state court.”Further, the decision held that “It is not at all self-evident
that this is what the Supreme Court meant, and it is even less
self-evident that the Supreme Court impliedly created a monolithic
federal rule trumping state court adoption procedures. The Court’s
clarification certainly leaves room for states to determine under their
own adoption procedures when an eligible candidate has come forward such
that the preferences should be applied.”

The Alaska Assistant Attorney General Jacklyn Schafer told
local media in Anchorage that the Tununak ruling hinged upon the methods
by which the grandmother expressed her intention to adopt with the
court.“The question in this adoption appeal then became did the
grandmother formally seek to adopt the child. Even though she didn’t
file an adoption petition, or intervene in the adoption case, or attend
the adoption hearing,” Schafer said, “she did testify in the related
child in need of aid case placement hearing that she wanted custody.”“That aspect of the Adoptive Couple [decision] really worried
me at the time,” said Barbara Atwood, Mary Anne Richey Professor Emerita
of Law and Director, Family and Juvenile Certificate Program at the
University of Arizona School of Law. “Alito's opinion seemed to hold
that 1915 preferences don't come into play if there is only one adoptive
placement before the court. This could mean that a state and a tribe
would be in a race to the courthouse. If the state proposes an adoptive
placement and there is no ICWA-compliant placement yet identified, 1915
could be ignored.”The National Indian Child Welfare Association issued a
statement on Friday evening decrying the decision, which it contends is
in direct defiance of both the letter and intent of the Indian Child
Welfare Act.“NICWA is disappointed by the decision of the Alaska Supreme Court in Native Village of Tununak II v the State of Alaska.
Cultural knowledge and recent social science research tell us that
children who are raised by family members have better long-term
outcomes,” the statement read. “This decision was not only a failure to
correctly interpret the law, but also a failure to understand what is in
the best interest of this child. In its decision, the Alaska Supreme
Court erred in its interpretation of Adoptive Couple v. Baby Girl.”

Atwood concurred on the legal notion that the Alaska Supreme
Court has erred in allowing Adoptive Couple to control the outcome of
this case.“Whether [Adoptive Couple] should be applied in the context of
an involuntary termination of parental rights is a more difficult
issue,” said Atwood. “Breyer, as the necessary fifth vote, seemed to say
in his concurrence [with the majority] that the holdings should be
confined to the facts of the case. He was talking about the 1912
rulings, however, not the 1915 aspect.”“Still, there's an argument that the Alaska court was wrong to view the issue as absolutely controlled by Adoptive Couple.”According to NICWA, last week’s decision has created an even
greater barrier for Native people and tribes to retain their children,
which goes directly against the original intent when Congress enacted
ICWA in 1978.“This decision is not only counter to the letter and spirit of
the Indian Child Welfare Act, but also creates additional burdens for
Native family members wishing to adopt,” NICWA’s statement read. “Our
court systems should not be thwarting family members stepping forward to
provide loving homes. Instead, they should be doing everything in their
power to support the best interest of these children and the families
that deeply love them.”

Today, as more cases – both challenging and upholding the
Indian Child Welfare Act – continue to fill court dockets across the
country, references to “Baby Veronica” and Adoptive Couple v Baby Girl
are present in nearly every single pleading before the courts, as well
as every single ruling handed down. The recent appellate ruling in CFS v J.E.et al,
and the previous overturn of the adoption of an Absentee Shawnee girl
from Oklahoma are merely indicative, say experts, of the decision in
Adoptive Couple that continues to create confusion and confrontation
between the tribes and the states.As such, Adoptive Couple and its aftermath continues to
reverberate throughout Indian Country, with more attention than ever
being paid to the 35-year-old statute that had little media attention
before the epic battle over ICWA played out before the entire world.
Because or perhaps in spite of Veronica, states, tribes and tribal
members, particularly in Oklahoma, California and South Dakota, are
beginning to push for greater enforcement and tighter restrictions in
the foster care and adoption of Native American children under the
Indian Child Welfare Act.In a statement from the Cherokee Nation, assistant attorney
general Chrissi Nimmo discussed the impact of Baby Veronica and her hope
for the continued application of ICWA for all tribes.“I think of Veronica and the entire Brown family often. I know
that all of Cherokee Nation misses her and hopes for the best for her,”
says Chrissi Nimmo, Assistant Attorney General for the Cherokee Nation
who worked around the clock for over a year on this case. “If any
lasting good comes from the case, it is that Veronica brought attention
to ICWA and unethical adoptions. The Cherokee Nation will continue to
strive to be a leader among tribes in ensuring ICWA compliance to make
sure that native children are raised by their families and their tribes
as ICWA intended and as it should be.”

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What our Nations are up against!

To Veronica Brown

Veronica, we adult adoptees are thinking of you today and every day. We will be here when you need us. Your journey in the adopted life has begun, nothing can revoke that now, the damage cannot be undone. Be courageous, you have what no adoptee before you has had; a strong group of adult adoptees who know your story, who are behind you and will always be so.

TWO WORLDS Book 1 (second edition)

Two Worlds anthology (Vol. 1)

“…sometimes shocking, often an emotional read…this book is for individuals interested in the culture and history of the Native American Indian, but also on the reading lists of universities offering ethnic/culture/Native studies.”

“Well-researched and obviously a subject close to the heart of the authors/compilers, I found the extent of what can only be described as ‘child-snatching’ from the Native Americans quite staggering. It’s not something I was aware of before…”

“The individual pieces are open and honest and give a good insight into the turmoil of dislocation from family and tribe… I think it does have value and a story to tell. I was affected by the stories I read, and amazed by the facts presented…. because it is saying something new, interesting and often astonishing.”

Survivors, write your stories. Write your parents stories. Write the elders stories. Do not be swayed by the colonizers to keep quiet. Tribal Nations have their own way of keeping stories alive.... Trace

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Good words

I agree with you on the caring of “orphans” – true orphans, not “paper orphans” as Kathryn Joyce describes in her book, The Child Catchers. The most important thing to remember, however, is that the orphan’s original identity and family connection and heritage must remain intact and available to him or her forever. This business of adoption – and I do mean the multi-billion-dollar, unregulated business of adoption – of wiping out the child’s original identity, falsifying birth records with the adopters’ names, altering facts such as place of birth, severing familial kinship, must stop … Immediately. And the outrageous injustices foisted upon adoptees and their families for the past 100 years must be addressed and righted. We are faced today with six to seven million people who were basically legally kidnapped, sold to the highest bidder, their identities falsified, and placed in a lifelong, imposed witness protection program for which there is no legal recourse. Then told by church officials, agency and government functionaries that they have no right to know who they are, to do genealogy or learn about important family medical history, or know the identity of or associate with blood relatives. This is how the Judeo-Christian society has interpreted “caring for orphans”, for it’s own selfish interests and greed. Starting with Georgia Tann, the woman charged with kidnapping and selling 5,000 children, most of whom were given to the rich and powerful who then colluded with her to “seal” adoptions and cover their nefarious activities (see, for example, Gov. Herbert Lehman, NY, 1935).

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adoptees take back adoption narrative and reject propaganda

Lost Birds on Al Jazeera Fault Lines

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Canada's Residential Schools

The religious organizations that operated the schools — the Anglican Church of Canada, Presbyterian Church in Canada, United Church of Canada, Jesuits of English Canada and some Catholic groups — in 2015 expressed regret for the “well-documented” abuses. The Catholic Church has never offered an official apology, something that Trudeau and others have repeatedly called for.

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Karen Vigneault (1958-2019)

https://www.c-span.org/video/?326149-1/a-generation-removed

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ADOPTION TRUTH

As the single largest unregulated industry in the United States, adoption is viewed as a benevolent action that results in the formation of “forever families.” The truth is that it is a very lucrative business with a known sales pitch. With profits last estimated at over $1.44 billion dollars a year, mothers who consider adoption for their babies need to be very aware that all of this promotion clouds the facts and only though independent research can they get an accurate account of what life might be like for both them and their child after signing the adoption paperwork.

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Original Birth Certificate Map in the USA

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